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[quote=Bill Bremmer Those of you who have speculated on who GP is are not even warm. You'll never guess in a hundred years. The most I'll say is what he has already said, that he is a classically trained musician and performs as such. I do wish you all could experience his amazing technique. He is a man of talent and has done remarkably well so far in tuning his piano. Any of the professional technicians on here would find tuning his piano and putting the tuning up for display on here to be quite a challenge. [/quote]

As far as me publishing an article, I'm not sure anyone wants to hear anything I have to say about anything but I'm about to say it for the first time right here. Buckele your seatbelts.

One topic that does interest me is how molecules, specifically protons, spin in nature. I know, now I sound like a real wacko, but protons do spin. In fact all molecules spin or more specifically, undergo precision. They spin a wobble like a top. The interesting part is that they spin at a very specific rate and direction when put in a magnetic field. They orient themselves north and south in that magnet and spin at a very specific rate depending on what other molecules are around them. That's the fundamental reason we can see things like herniated discs with MRI. Now what does that have to do with tuning and temperaments? My theory, and as far as I know it is just mine, is that our atoms respond when exposed to certain frequencies. Just like in an MRI machine, energy is absorbed when the correct frequncies are experienced. Everybody has experienced the feeling of music washing over them when something happens that's just right at a concert. I actually think we feel music as much as we hear music. When the piano is tuned correctly and the frquencies somehow line up a certain way, we can feel it, not just hear it. I believe something happens at the molecular level for that experience to take place. In fact the whole universe can be expressed as a domain of frequncies as defined by Fourier transform.

How's that sound for the subject of an article? Pretty wild stuff huh?

As far as EBVT III goes, I find it facinating. It does exactly what music and art are meant to do, create tension, then resolve it. At times EBVT makes me feel very uneasy and uncomfortable because I'm not sure where it's headed, but then somehow it finds a home and resolves. It creates far more tension then ET. If a person likes it or not is purely a matter of taste, and I won't debate taste very often. Those that have expressed negative reactions to EBVT III I think are very sensitive to that tension similar to how many people felt during the premiere of Rite of Spring when fights broke out in the audience. I just saw that with the Philadelphia Orchestra and it is at times a very uncomfortable piece. I also think we have inherited memory from the cosmos in our DNA and because of that, certain combination of frequencies rub us either the wrong or the right way. I just haven't quite figured out why that is or what those secret memories from the beginning of time are just yet. I have a feeling the beginning of the universe was a very traumatic event.

There are many extremes in the life of a piano technician. I won't try to list them all here but how long it takes to tune a piano very well is a good example. Many times, I simply must get the job done as quickly as I possibly can for whatever reason. I do it and it happens. However, I would also say that when I have had all the time in the world to get a piano tuning to a state of complete, flawless perfection, that has never happened once, not even in 8 hours of concentrated work, not in over 40 years of wishing that I could. There is always some kind of cut off point. The closer one is to that ultimate state of perfection, the more elusive it becomes.

This is very comforting to hear, Bill. Lately my tuning average time has been increasing. I'm getting stuck in the variety of choices. I have to start commanding myself to let it go, and to start listening again...

The headline would be "EBVT III Pipe Organ Effect Spotted in Kabalevsky."

Indeed, I got out some Kabalevsky to practice last night--some stuff I hadn't worked on since Bill tuned my piano to EBVT III. Lo and behold! I was merrily playing a prelude, when what to my wondering ears should appear, but the pipe organ effect, perfectly clear!

It's at the end of this little one minute piece of music, played a little frantically but I hope you can forgive that--It was an exciting discovery! (All the standard disclaimers apply: Lester spinet, creaky bench, blah, blah, blah...)

Thanks for that example, Andy! I really liked it. Your little piano is holding up fairly well. I'm also glad you found a piece where the pipe organ effect is heard in a true musical context, the way the music was written.

As far as me publishing an article, I'm not sure anyone wants to hear anything I have to say about anything but I'm about to say it for the first time right here. Buckele your seatbelts.

One topic that does interest me is how molecules, specifically protons, spin in nature. I know, now I sound like a real wacko, but protons do spin... [etc.]

Sorry you asked yet?

Well, Ralph, the article on FT is way, way over my head but the fact that temperament can and does have an emotional effect on people is not. I'm not at all sure whether it can be explained in terms of how a temperament can make people's protons spin a certain way but clearly, the effects of temperament and other ways a piano may be tuned can be either pleasing or displeasing.

I did find the Blackstone piano website interesting. In particular, this quote:

Bach Prelude

Why not provide a musical example of what my tuning sounds like, before you delve into my tuning method? I’ve included a recording of J.S. Bach’s Prelude #1 from The Well-Tempered Clavier recorded after I finished tuning the piano for this tutorial. I don’t claim to be much of a pianist; I only recorded this so people could hear an example of my tuning, not to be critiqued on my playing ability (so go easy on me). Mr. Bach wrote the most elaborate and beautiful tuning test ever created. It is a brutally honest reflection of the accuracy and consistency of the tuning, as well as a check on the evenness of the piano’s action regulation and voicing.

We have heard many examples of this same music from examples in Reverse Well both in error and deliberately, in ET with and without the pedal and also in the EBVT III. It is interesting that some piano technicians only like it in ET while it is clear that Bach would have never heard it or played it that way. It is also interesting that Mr. Blackstone (I assume that is his name) considers the piece to be a test and confirmation of a correctly executed ET. When you hear no change of mood during the modulations, it is right, according to him but Bach clearly wrote the music to have those moods represented.

Many people argue that more modern music, usually anything 19th Century or later and certainly any music 20th Century forward was written with no effects from temperament in mind. To put effects in the music alters it. Doesn't removing effects from earlier music likewise alter it from what was intended? We have already heard some comments about the effects the EBVT III has on music both pro and con and more should be forthcoming soon (according to my private mail).

As far as me publishing an article, I'm not sure anyone wants to hear anything I have to say about anything but I'm about to say it for the first time right here. Buckele your seatbelts.

One topic that does interest me is how molecules, specifically protons, spin in nature. I know, now I sound like a real wacko, but protons do spin... [etc.]

Sorry you asked yet?

Well, Ralph, the article on FT is way, way over my head but the fact that temperament can and does have an emotional effect on people is not.

When you hear no change of mood during the modulations, it is right, according to him but Bach clearly wrote the music to have those moods represented.

That's my quandary. Why do certain combinations of sounds create mood? Obviously they do. To over simplify, a major chord makes us happy while a minor chord makes us sad. It's very strange why we assign and experience emotions with sounds. The EBVT III creates beats with certain intervals that we are not used to hearing with ET. Some can tolerate those beats, others find them challenging, difficult or even irritating. Helmholtz did a lot of experimenting with perception. He was primarily involved with eye sight, but how we see is nothing more than the perception of wavelengthes. Each of use probably sees a liitle differenly. What one would describe as red another may also, but it's probably slightly different. Someone else may see it as green. Who's right when it's merely a perception? Our entire experience of our world is primarily through vision and hearing, both of which are perceptions and interpretations of frequency and wavelength.

Your EVBT III has definitely tapped into a primitive part of our brains which conjure up all kinds of emotions. EBVT III does create mood. I still find ET pleasing but it is a little sterile and vanilla when compared to EBVT III.

Cinnamonbear, thanks for your recording. You can really hear that "pipe" organ effect towards the end.

Ralph, that's what I was referring to as an "earthy" sound when trying to explain in words what EBVT III felt like. Now that I hear piano music with this added dimension to it, I want to hear more, and when I hear ET now, it's missing that added dimension.

I don't think I posted this one, another of Roger William's pieces from the Pianocorder Contemporary Artist series. You can hear the color changes and the moods EBVT III brings to the piece, especially in the lower section of the piano, and even with my slightly out-of-tune treble.

Some people like their food spicey while others do not. I like the spice.

I had an interesting experience a while back. I was playing the piano one day and thought to myself that it sounded extraordinarily good. I actually thought it was more "harmonious" than the previous day. About a minute later my wife came in the room and made the exact same comment to me. Then she asked why does the piano sound so good today? I didn't have an answer, but had the same opinion. I broke out my Verituner and started measuring pitches. I had it tuned to EVBT III which I did a few days earlier. The lower tenor section had gone just a little flat which in essence created a wider stretch. Mind you, I'm talking a very small amount. Maybe 0.3 to no more than 0.5 cents. The difference was really amazing. It was so much better. The next day it was gone. I wasn't smart enough to save the pitches into my VT.

Try retuning using another mild well temperament. Either the Koval variable well 2.0, the Coleman 11, or maybe the Broadwoods best are all similar in strength to the EBVT III. All can be found under Well temperaments in the Verituner. PM me if you want to try a stretch style that should enhance the alternate tempered tuning. (what did you use before?)

I think... what's been percieved here by people that enjoy the recordings is not so much an EBVTIII phenomenon, but an alternate temperament with a particular approach to octave stretch - Bill's mindless octaves.

A few years ago you actually emailed me a stretch that you use for Steinway Bs. I don't have the B anymore, but now I have a D. I've been using your stretch with good results. I don't really like the stretches built in the VT. I've changed the precentages of the partials a little, but can't quite get it right. I'm using 60% 10:5 and 40% 6:3 in the bass up to C1 I think and then start increasing the 6:3. If you have a custom stretch for an S&S D I'd love to try it. The biggest problem I'm having is getting the octaves from Bb4-Bb5 to G5-G6 to sound clean.

I have tried your Koval 2.0 and even lowered the offsets by 1/2 to create a milder temperament and called it Koval 1.0. I've also tried Braodwwods Best, but never Coleman 11. The ranges of the offsets of the major thirds scare me a bit.

Glen,I just studied your Bach C maj prelude comparisons, and here's what I hear. (I know this piece VERY well)...

The EBVT III is quieter, wetter, and sweeter. The prior ET is "pokey," meaning it pokes at your ears. It is cutting and harsh and sour by comparison. Your playing is very thoughtful, sensitive, and even (which is VERY difficult to pull off in any rendering of this piece). Kudos.

I wonder if Bach knew what he was giving future generations when he wrote this "test piece"?

I also wonder if Jeff Beck knew what he was doing when he recorded "Goodbye Porkpie Hat"? Jeff Beck made some poke-notes in his rendition as well!...

Hi Cinnamonbear,Thanks for noticing and commenting on a couple of the pieces I played before and after tuning in EBVT III. I've been out of town for awhile; just now catching up...

I am getting ready for my first-ever recital in May (five pieces), so I am taking a bit of extra care in my playing. I placed a few other non-classical pieces (improvs) that were played in a variety of keys in hopes there would be notable differences. They certainly are subtle.

The immediate feedback I've received from a few customers in which I've tuned their piano in as close as I can get it in EBVT III has been positive. I was receiving positive responses from others when I was attempting ET as well, so I am not sure many of the customers can decipher the differences.

The true test will be when I go back to tune the same customer's piano in EBVT III on which I previously tuned it in ET.

Keep in mind, I have just under 100 aural tunings on different pianos under my belt since embarking on this journey and consistency of results is still a work in progress. I won't leave until I tune a customer's piano to my satisfaction, although the customer is frequently happy with it before I have made my final tweaks. I am finding that I spend more time tuning consoles and uprights than grands...

My piano teacher likes the EBVT III tuning, but she claims that complex/dense chords sound "wrong" to her ear. My girlfriend is somewhat tired of all this comparison recording I do, but regardless, she prefers ET and does not want me to tune her Bluthner 4 in EBVT III, as even a test.

Anyway, my piano no longer has a fresh EBVT III tuning on it and it seems to have settled, if that is the right term. It is still quite playable and I don't have any inclination to put a fresh tuning on it yet. However, with a fresh tuning, I am trying to figure out a way to make Eb-min, Ab, Db sound richer, like it does in ET. There is more color in EBVT III in those keys and all keys, but the richness (if that is the right term for it) is quite different than in ET. Now that I am learning to tune; becoming a tuner now affects how I listen to any piano!

I like having the ability to tune different types - it is part of the interminable learning curve.

When I listen to the radio in the car - I hear good music played on pianos that are too far out of tune for my novice ear. I am poisoned!

Thanks for posting all of those files side by side, Glen. That should give Andy some easily accessible material for the study he wants to do.

Those who talk about the differences between any particular mild WT are correct in the observation that they all do essentially the same thing: restore key color. The EBVT II and EBVT III were a response to the comment that the original EBVT was still a bit too unequal to please the most squeamish taste. The Moore & Moore (or something like that anyway) is milder and Ron Koval's experiments are too.

The EBVTs are written the way they are so as to be easily replicable as aural tuning sequences but they do have their own unique characteristics.

Ralph, if the Coleman 11 scares you, you might try to find the Coleman 16. One thing will always be true: the more you try to eliminate harshness in the bottom of the cycle of 5ths, the less harmoniousness there will be in the top. The closer you get to ET, the less emotion will be expressed. If there is a desire for that emotion but a squeamishness for the consequences, there can still be that one right temperament for each individual. ETD users who desire the very mildest departure from ET are encouraged to explore the 1/9 Comma Meantone. I published the data for that a few pages back.

Here is a track from a Jazz concert that I tuned for in 2002. The piano is a Yamaha C7. The recording is the pure, raw feed from the sound engineer with no mixing or alteration of any kind (although it could have used some balancing). The tuning is the original EBVT. Make up your own mind as to whether an unequal temperament can work for Jazz or not. I spoke to the pianist afterward and told him that the tuning was "different", he replied, "I noticed and I liked it!" He asked what I did differently and I said I could send him some written material about it. He said, "I don't need to read about it, I heard it!"

From what I can tell Bill, the piano blended beautifully with the ensemble.

For a little toe-tapping 1920's music, here are 2 Fox Trots, in EBVT III.....(how did they ever come up with the name "Fox Trots"....I guess the music conjured up trotting Fox's...LOL Here is a link to Wikipedia's explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxtrot

It does blend nicely. The pianist was obviously into it. There seems to be a sensation of the piano 'riding on top' slightly rather than just disappearing into the musical mix, while at the same time blending in well.

I haven't got the nerve to deviate from my ET comfort zone yet. Maybe one day. I find it fascinating.

Bill has done a great service by making a clear set of aural directions...

I was working with a student that prefers to avoid machines, but wanted to be able to alter standard tunings - both stretch and temperaments. I consider many of the directions in the big red book unusable - a series of beat rates to replicate without any consideration of the specific piano...

She was easily able to follow the recipe (heck, even I could!) and I told how easy it was to vary the strength with the setting of the F-A speed.

Thanks for that example, Andy! I really liked it. Your little piano is holding up fairly well. I'm also glad you found a piece where the pipe organ effect is heard in a true musical context, the way the music was written.

Yay, Bill! Thanks! Northern Illinois is a harsh climate for pianos, especially in a family that likes to throw open the windows when it finally warms up to 55F! (Maybe that's why the old Schiller on the porch intrigued me--I thought I could improve its lot in life by a degree! ) The Lester sounds really fine to my ears, and since I found that pipe organ effect in it, I had to share.

The expression in the performance was not what I was after, though. I was hoping for something quieter and more fluid. So I tried something yesterday when I was in a calmer frame of mind. I played it with the soft pedal held down through the whole piece and slowed down the tempo. Unfortunately, what I got was a performance that might be called "languid." But, I'm posting it here anyway because the pipe organ effect in it is so different.

I'm going to post the two versions on Pianist Corner Member Rercordings for help with the expression.

I also plan on posting the other pipe organ effect clips in a separate thread there. Which reminds me, Does anybody remember the post (I think it was Patrick's) that had the YouTube clip of the solo pianist in a concert hall playing a piece that had the pipe organ effect in it? I think it was Carnival of the Animals, but I'm not sure? I've been looking and looking and can't find it, but I know I saw it and I think it was back in January. Help, please!

GP, Glen, Bill, can't wait to listen to the new recordings. Right now, it's off to work, Hi, Ho!

Bill has done a great service by making a clear set of aural directions...

I was working with a student that prefers to avoid machines, but wanted to be able to alter standard tunings - both stretch and temperaments. I consider many of the directions in the big red book unusable - a series of beat rates to replicate without any consideration of the specific piano...

She was easily able to follow the recipe (heck, even I could!) and I told how easy it was to vary the strength with the setting of the F-A speed.

Nice work to all of you willing to post recordings!

Ron Kovalchicagoland

Thank you for these comments, Ron. The whole reason I developed the EBVT was because there was no usable Victorian style temperament instructions in the big red book. In 1992, I had the SAT II but I hadn't really learned to use it yet. There was no way to apply temperament correction figures except if one did that manually and I would never have spent a half hour doing that, possibly make errors, etc., when I could be nearly done with an aural tuning in that amount of time.

Jorgensen's Handbook of Equal Beating Temperaments had the only temperament instructions I could follow because in them, an interval was either pure or made to beat the same as another. That I could do. I could also do the Vallotti temperament because half the 5ths were pure and the other twice as tempered as in ET. Among those tempered intervals, 4ths beat the same as M3s.

All of those temperaments, except for the Marpurg (which is a quasi ET with no key color) however proved to be too unequal to work as a "universal" temperament. Jorgensen did provide a clue, however in section 73 of the red book, Tuning According to One's Own Personal Taste. That is where the beat speed clue for the F3-A3 M3 is found. It sets the "throttle", so to speak.

You are well aware of the "long road" it took to develop and finalize those instructions. As an aural tuner, I could always make things work out to my satisfaction but putting them in writing and having them work out theoretically was very difficult.

The final sequence, however works very well. It can be used to create an earlier style WT or even a modified meantone just by slowing down the initial F3-M3 M3. The F3-F4 temperament octave from an A fork is familiar to most aural tuners. It does not require the complex checks that ET does in order to be completely accurate to the intent.

Jorgensen noted that the EBVT III is numerically a virtual replica of one of Neidhardt's temperaments that he developed later in life when he, like Rameau and Werkmeister were gravitating toward the idea of ET, that all key tonalities would be equally accessible. Neidhardt applied the term, "circulating" to the idea.

Here is another partial track from the 2002 Jazz concert. It began with a long, solo piano segment which unfortunately the engineer lost all but the tail end of, having not noticed that his digital tape had run out. There is enough remaining, however to hear how the EBVT works with Gospel type piano playing as a sample.

Some interesting anecdotes about this music: The Yamaha dealer had the piano tuned prior to delivery, so it was on pitch in a fairly good ET. He told the nightclub owner that it would only need a "touch up" if anything. The dealer called me and warned me NOT to tune the piano in any "crazy tuning". He additionally warned me that I would be liable for "damages" if he had to hire a technician to tune the piano "back" after the event. The technician who had tuned it attended the event and saw me and we spoke briefly. I recall him saying, "I guess it sounds OK from here".

Having taken over an hour to tune the piano, pounding hard and working fast, all entirely by ear, the club owner asked me when I finished, "Was the piano badly out of tune?" I replied, "No, just a little but it still takes time to change the whole piano just a little".

Of course, I completely ignored the warning and threat by the dealer. The promoter of the event was my client and an avid Jazz pianist and wanted me and only me to tune the piano the way I tuned it. After the event, the dealer questioned the promoter about it and that is what was said. What the artists want prevails.

Within only four years of the event, the promoter, the pianist, the nightclub and the dealer were all deceased. Therefore, what you hear in this clip is a historical performance in many regards. If there is enough interest, I will try to find other tracks that I think would be interesting from a piano technician and pianist's view to hear how an aurally tuned EBVT worked at that time.

...(how did they ever come up with the name "Fox Trots"....I guess the music conjured up trotting Fox's...LOL Here is a link to Wikipedia's explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxtrot

While I was out and about today, I stopped at the pullick liberry and looked up "fox-trot" in the Oxford English Dictionary. It lists when words first entered the printed record. Here is an abbreviated version, reformatted and with added punctuation for readability:

fox-trot , sb.1. A pace with short steps, as in changing from trotting to walking.

2. A modern dance, of American origin, consisting chiefly of alternating measures of long and short steps; also, a piece of music suitable as an accompaniment for the fox-trot.

1915Truth, 17 Mar., 1/5, "A new dance, the 'Fox-trot', a relation of..'Ragtime'." 1915Victor Record Catal., May, "Dance records... Fox trots." 1917 S. B. Leacock, Frenzied Fiction, (1919), v. 70, "The others were dancing the fox-trot to the victrola on the piazza." 1919 G.D'Egville, How & What to Dance, (1922), 55, "The Fox-Trot is a dance of many steps, and to the casual observer everybody seems to have different ones." 1919 E. Scott, All about Latest Dances, 68, "The true basis of the American Fox-Trot is an alternation of four slow and four or eight quick movements, depending on the step chosen." 1923 ---A.B.C. of Dancing, 84, "The foxtrot is not a dance in the sense that the waltz and polka are dances because it has no distinctive rhythm and no characteristic step or figure."1928Melody Maker, Feb., 127/1, "You have just heard a fox-trot, 'I call her honey because she sticks to me'."1946 R. Capell, Simiomata 11, 48, "Kirou remembers Macaskie singing foxtrots."

On a related note, there was a fox in our backyard twice this week, rare in an urban setting such as ours. It really did trot.

Funny how these things work, don't 'cha think?

Ralph, I truly believe we all respond to frequencies in deep and mysterious ways, that we are in tune with certain people and not in tune with others, that life is largely made up of cycles and rhythms, and that we need a new forum on Piano World called "Metaphysicians Corner." I once worked with someone who couldn't get near a computer without having it go haywire. LOVED your post!

A large part of the enjoyment when playing these piano rolls, is reading the words as they go by on the right hand side of the roll. They lyrics are a kick, reflecting the culture of pop music in America when the music was composed in the 1920' and 30's. The reason these words were printed on the roll, was to enable everyone to gather 'round the piano and sing along. Before stereos and TV's, this was the entertainment in living rooms that could afford a player piano.

Here are the lyrics to "The Night When Love Was Born" You can actually sing along!

NIGHT WHEN LOVE WAS BORN, THEAbel Baer / David Oppenheim / Young

as rec by Elsie Carlisle 1930's

also rec by Connie Boswell w The Dorsey Bros Orch 1932

You took my lips and sprinkled them with twilight,Oh what a night, the night that love was born!You took my eyes and thrilled them with a June night;I blessed the night, that night when love was born!

The trees did cover dawn beside a silver stream,With leaves they covered us so we could dream and dream.You took my heart and dipped it in the moonlight,That wondrous night, the night when love was born!

Just one Summer night of tendernessMade a lonely heart confessOf a love divine.Just one Summer night meant happiness,That was when I whispered, "Yes!",And it made you mine!

The trees did cover dawn beside a silver stream,With leaves they covered us so we could dream and dream.You took my heart and dipped it in the moonlight,That wondrous night, the night when love was born!

Here is another partial track from the 2002 Jazz concert. It began with a long, solo piano segment which unfortunately the engineer lost all but the tail end of, having not noticed that his digital tape had run out. There is enough remaining, however to hear how the EBVT works with Gospel type piano playing as a sample.

Some interesting anecdotes about this music: The Yamaha dealer had the piano tuned prior to delivery, so it was on pitch in a fairly good ET. He told the nightclub owner that it would only need a "touch up" if anything. The dealer called me and warned me NOT to tune the piano in any "crazy tuning". He additionally warned me that I would be liable for "damages" if he had to hire a technician to tune the piano "back" after the event. The technician who had tuned it attended the event and saw me and we spoke briefly. I recall him saying, "I guess it sounds OK from here".

Having taken over an hour to tune the piano, pounding hard and working fast, all entirely by ear, the club owner asked me when I finished, "Was the piano badly out of tune?" I replied, "No, just a little but it still takes time to change the whole piano just a little".

Of course, I completely ignored the warning and threat by the dealer. The promoter of the event was my client and an avid Jazz pianist and wanted me and only me to tune the piano the way I tuned it. After the event, the dealer questioned the promoter about it and that is what was said. What the artists want prevails.

Within only four years of the event, the promoter, the pianist, the nightclub and the dealer were all deceased. Therefore, what you hear in this clip is a historical performance in many regards. If there is enough interest, I will try to find other tracks that I think would be interesting from a piano technician and pianist's view to hear how an aurally tuned EBVT worked at that time.